The health reform Bill moves one step closer

So there we have it. The Health and Social Care Bill has been passed by the House of Commons with a majority of 65. My heart sank when I heard the news. Without doubt, this signals the end of the NHS as we know it. I felt depressed and betrayed. I have no particular affiliation to any political party or ideological tie to the NHS. I defend the NHS because the evidence shows that it is the best system to deliver health care.

So I decided to vote for the Liberal Democrats in the last general election because I thought that the NHS would be safest in their hands. But I had failed to take into account the sweet allure of power, the heady top notes of which they have tasted since sipping at the poisoned chalice of coalition government.

Before the vote, sources close to Nick Clegg were reported as saying: “We expect MPs to vote with the government. Otherwise we won’t last very long [in power].” It was clear that voting was about power, not what was best for the people. In the end, only four Liberal Democrats were brave enough to rebel and vote against it.

What the vote has shown is that the many of the political elite in this country no longer care about representing the views of the people they are mandated to serve. Butworse than this Machiavellian posturing and self-interest is the misrepresentation and deceit that has been adopted in order to push these reforms through.

David Cameron promised no top-down reorganisation of the NHS, only to introduce a top-down reorganisation of the NHS. His Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley, assured us that he would cut bureaucracy, and then proposed a bill that will see bureaucracy increase.

We were told they were listening to concerns and that concessions had been made, only for no meaningful changes to be proposed in the amended Bill. We have had assurances that the NHS will not be privatised, only for freedom-of-information requests to show that the Department of Health has already had talks with a German company, Helios, about taking over NHS hospitals.

During Prime Minister’s Question Time last week, Cameron stood up and said that the Royal College of Nurses, the Royal College of GPs and the Royal College of Physicians all supported the reforms, forcing all of them to issue statements contradicting this and expressing their concerns.

We are told we need reform to tackle spiralling costs. But the NHS has shown itself to be one of the cheapest health-care systems in the world. Undeterred by evidence or fact, the Government pushed forward with its rhetoric. Despite what we are being assured, a privately run but publicly funded health service is the end of the NHS. The commercial interests of the providers become paramount.

We have already seen what happens when we open up the NHS to the market. Private Finance Initiative (PFI) was introduced by the Labour government amid assurances that it would make services more efficient and cost effective, yet the opposite has been shown to be the case.

The costs of PFI contracts have crippled trusts. Official figures show that, under PFI schemes, taxpayers are committed to paying £229 billion for new hospitals, schools and other projects with a capital value of just £56 billion. Some of the private companies are due to see returns of more than 70 per cent.

This new Bill takes the principles of PFI and replicates them on a gargantuan scale. It takes a knife to the soft underbelly of the NHS and splays it open, disembowelling it for private companies to pick over the soft, juicy and profitable entrails. And it is we, the tax paying public, who will pay handsomely for this.

It will be a disaster for those with chronic, complex, debilitating conditions with no discernible end point that a price tag can be ruthlessly slapped on. For the commercial sector, these individuals are worthless, fiscally desiccated specimens out of which no profit can be squeezed. State-run services will be obliged to care for these individuals and, with no profitability attached, undermine its own position in the new market place.

It is worthwhile remembering that the Commonwealth Fund report last year placed the NHS top for equity, efficiency, safety, effectiveness and patient satisfaction. It was also cheaper than France, Germany and the US. That is not to say that there is not room for improvement. It seems utterly perverse, however, to open up our system to providers in other countries, such as American and German health-care companies, which, as shown by the Commonwealth Fund report, have a track record of providing a more expensive and inferior services in their own countries.

The Bill now passes to the House of Lords, where it will be debated. We can only hope that they have the sense and independence of mind to put the interests of the electorate first and put right this tragic wrong that has been done to our health-care system.